I can not remember the name of the family who lived next to the Armstrongs, my pseudo family. The neighbor’s family kept a dog. That was a collie. The Armstrongs’ house was located slightly below the top of the hill. The neighbor’s house was located right at the top. When I drove back from school, I slowed down in front of the neighbor’s house to stop the car at the Armstrongs’ driveway.
Very often we saw the stupid collie wandering around in front of the house. When it found a car run before the house, somehow it got very excited and set off to run around the car. The dog got excited, not because it wanted to keep away the suspicious from its master, but because it simply wanted something to run around with. I did not interview the dog. Probably no one knew why it chased cars. It just appeared to me that the dog’s barks and skips showed its joy. Let’s just assume that it was delighted. Yet the passers-by, including me, were not. Mailmen, ice cream vendors, and the residents nearby were really annoyed by the dog.
Whenever a car went by, the dog dashed out of the neighbor’s front yard toward the car on the road. Then it first took the tail of the car. The driver can sense the dog approaching by its barks and heavy breath. When it ran right behind the car, it could not be spotted through the rear view mirror. Then it usually came around to the left side and run together with the car.
At this moment, the driver could see the dog running outside of the window. It usually turned to the driver eye to eye and barked joyfully, while running. Then it proudly ran into the front side, again, out of the driver’s view. The dog ran so close to the front bumper that it could not be seen. Drivers, for fear of run over the dog, slowed down or stopped the cars. The dog, because of the abrupt end of his joy, came back to the driver’s door and barked to demand another fun ride.
Basically this was all that the silly dog did. Only variation of the drivers’ unpleasant experience was the initial location of the dog. It very often laid itself in the front yard. It showed up in the short bush across the road on some days; or it even waited for a car to come up sitting right on the road on other days.
I, as a man of short temper, got terribly frustrated by the dog. I resolved to train the dog. One day the dog was waiting on the road for a company to run together. I spotted it and immediately slowed down. The dog looked very much disappointed, for my car was too slow to run with. I advanced my car bit by bit to the dog. It was just like crawling. It may have taken several minutes to reach the dog. The stupid dog was still on the road lying.
Then I let the car precede, at about 2 kilometers per hour, to hit the dog. Bump! My car was too slow to run over the animal, and the car with 440 cubic inch engine was powerful enough to shove it away. I sensed that the dog was not ready to step aside. It was too late for the dog to let my car pass away. The dog, without any moment to stand sturdy, was simply shoved from the side for more than ten feet. I heard yelp and stopped the car. It got so frightened and ran away from the car. I recognized no visible damage on the dog and saw the dog off that day. I was happy for my successful training.
As far as I knew, the dog never attempted to run in front of my car after may special training. Maybe it did to other cars, but I was happy that it looked like the dog learned to stay away from my car. My happiness, however, did not last long.
A few days later, when I came back from the school, I noticed the dog in the bush. It also noticed my car pulled over to the curve. Then the dog came running toward the car barking cheerfully. It barked and sniffed around the drivers side. I was inside of the car. I did not intend to have a direct contact with the dog. So I waited inside of the car breathlessly to wait for the moment to come that the dog stepped into a range. A range within the radius of driver’s door.
I quietly unlocked the door. I pulled the lever to let the door unlatched. When the moment came to me, I, with all my might, kicked the door to hit the dog. The dog was struck badly by the bulletproof thick steel door and thrown over. I heard the yelp again. That was the sound of triumph to me. I got satisfied and stepped out of the car. I saw the dog off.
Now that the dog learned two precious lessons. Never run in front of the white Plymouth Fury. And never wander around the driver’s door of the white Plymouth Fury. Well, there remained one fun thing it could do with my car. That was to chase my car. I had to teach it not to do so.
Predictable enough, the dog started to chase my car one day. I could not see it, but it sure was right behind my car running. I hit the brake strongly to kill the speed as fast as I could. The momentum was considerable. The car took a few second to a complete stop. I did not hear anything on the rear bumper. The dog got away. It never collided with my car. I stared into the rear view mirror and found the dog standing just barely at the edge of the mirror.
I put shift lever into “reverse” and stepped hard on the gas pedal. The engine roared to the sudden acceleration. The dog now learned that it did something terribly bad. It got frightened and started to run away. But I would not quit to reinforce the lesson. I had to train the dog not to wander around behind the white Plymouth Fury this time. I continued to precede the car backward toward the dog. The dog must have thought that it had to get away from the rapidly upcoming rear bumper. It jumped into the bush.
Bush meant nothing to Plymouth Fury that my friend, Ben, called “Tank.” I advanced the car into the bush with no hesitation. It was really bumpy. My car swung like some fun-ride vessel in Disneyland. Short trees were shoved over. With roaring sound, the huge bouncing tank chased the dog in the bush. It was very difficult for me to get hold of the steering wheel. I learned that the jumping cars never proceed in the very direction that I aimed. It was a tough pursuit. But it was terrifying enough to the dog. It was head over heels. It jumped out of the bush and ran into its master’s house. Its yelp lingered in the air. I was happy.
While the neighbors were still talking about this relentless Japanese that drove around the “tank” in the bush, the dog must have sought desperately what was left for him to have fun with cars. On that day, I drove back and found the dog barely concealing itself in the bush. It was first sitting there until my car got close to him. When my car passed in front of it, it dashed out and first took the tail of the car. Again it was out of the rear view mirror and I couldn’t see it. But that was a taboo to the dog. It remembered the precious lesson. It could not come around to the driver’s side. That move had been forbidden, too.
Then it went around the right side of the car. I heard the annoying barks beyond the door on my right. It was running too close to the car for me to see. I turned back to the dog owner’s house. No one was watching what was going. I made a sudden turn to the right. Yes, the door touched the dog. The car and the dog had been running in parallel. The physical damage must have been minimum. But the collision itself was frightening enough for the dog. The dog yelped and disappeared. It was the very beginning of the real nightmare.
Maybe because the last fright I gave was too shocking to the dog, or maybe because the dog had limited number of memory slots to store physically risking lessons, it started to lay itself on the road to block the cars. Well, it was forbidden by the first lesson. I taught it again in the same manner as I had done before. Then it forgot the second lesson. The dog could not keep more than three lessons.
The dog was really persistent to redo the same thing in the designated order. I was also persistent to teach the lesson in the same order all over again. Mr. Armstrong said that it is that the unpleasant dog that was training us. It might be true. I just didn’t like the dog anyway. I followed the whole cyclical training menu until the dog disappeared. It was just a little before I left Klamath Falls. I don’t know why it disappeared. The dog owner might see his dog’s harsh training and decided to keep it in the cage.
By then, giving the lessons to the dog had become a part of daily issues that involved with no special feeling. It was just like picking up mails when the mails were in the mail box. I indifferently did that when the dog was there. The menu at least made my driving tech more rough and inconceivable. In that sense, it was a valuable experience.